Letís call it the fickle finger of fishing fate, and last Monday it pointed me in the right direction when I drove down to Solomons, MD, to try my luck on Chesapeake Bay rockfish, AKA striped bass AKA stripers. In Solomons I met up with nine other fishermen, primarily members of the Mason-Dixon Outdoor Writers Association, all eagerly anticipating a great day on the water.

So at sunrise we meet at the docks where we are divided into two groups of five anglers each. My group boards Captain Wally Talbertís 40-foot cabin boat, the Renegade. The other group assigns themselves to the Miss Regina II with Captain Robbie Robinson. So a few ticks past 7:00 a.m. as the red sun breaches the briny horizon, this pair of worthy and wizened crafts churn through the dimpled waters of the Chesapeake, picking their way through a labyrinth of crab pot buoys on a forty minute slog to mid bay where we hope to enjoy some hefty striper hook-ups.

Some excellent angling action for stripers in these waters has been the rule here throughout a season which opened the third week of April and closes the second week in December, so anglers still have plenty of time to load up their freezers with tasty rockfish fillets before the seasonís final gun sounds. Other anglers on board include Harry Guyer, Ed Felker, and Curt Bobzin and his wife Lynn. Solomonsí stalwart Loch Weems, who often pilots his own boat, the Loch Jaw, serves as mate today.

By 8:20 a.m. we reach the fishing grounds where Weems soon has six lines trolling in 33 feet of water behind the boat at varying distances and depths with a variety of lures -- bucktails, parachutes, and umbrella rigs -- intended to entice those hungry striped bass to bite. At the helm, Captain Wally maintains our trolling speed at the optimum 3 knots. Captain Robbie, on the Miss Regina, does the same, fishing the exact same waters in the same style boat with exactly the same equipment and lures, using the same exact fishing methodology. Given all those similarities, you would expect the results to be pretty much the same.

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But you would be wrong. This is where that finicky fickle finger figures in again. Within the first few minutes we hear cries of delight from the anglers aboard the Miss Regina as they pull a lunker rockfish over the rail. While we await our first action of the day, another cheer rises up from the Miss Regina and yet another trophy fish is hoisted into their boat. We cast a few dark looks at Mate Weems silently wondering what weíre not doing that the folks on the Miss Regina are. But the truth is both mates are performing the exact same tasks as are the captains. But as every veteran angler knows, fishing fortunes are capricious, favoring one boat over another even when they are fishing right next to one another.

But it takes only ten minutes of trolling before we get our first hit and Lynn Bobzin cranks in a little striped bass that falls far short of the 18-inch minimum size limit. Incidentally, the daily limit on stripers here is two per person. You are permitted to keep two fish over 18-inches but only one of those two can be over 28-inches. Over the next few hours the bite is fairly steady as we pull in one sub-limit throwback after another until Felker finally manages to wrest in a 19-inch fish that barely exceeds the 18-inch minimum threshold. But just so we donít get too cocky about our first legal striper of the day, another cheer rings out from the nearby Regina and, sure enough, they boat another huge in-your-face-Renegade striper.

So the tone for the day has been set, and while we enjoy steady action on smallish fish on the Renegade, the truly husky fish are being wrangled by the Regina crowd. In between bites, we amuse ourselves by sharing jokes and fish stories and watching pelicans and cormorants skim through the skies. Since we are also fishing in near proximity to the Patuxent River Naval Air Station, an occasional jet screaming overhead also provides entertainment.

At one point, after another triumphant and somewhat snarky message crackles over the radio reporting yet another beefy striper boated by the Regina, a frustrated Captain Wally emerges from his cabin, extends his arms toward the skies, and beseeches the fishing Gods for help and guidance. Itís an amusing, good-natured gesture, but the fishing Gods refuse to smile on us. By the time we arrive back at the docks around 1:00 p.m. we have actually managed to outfish the Regina crew with 20 stripers to their 15. Unfortunately our fish box contains only two keepers -- and at 18-inches and 19-inches they barely make the grade. My own personal tally is just three tiny throwbacks.

Truth be told, in most respects it really wasnít a bad dayís fishing aboard the Renegade, but it was an excellent day aboard the Miss Regina where each angler scored a 2-fish daily limit that included one fish each in the 28 to 32 inch trophy class. They had caught a total of 15 fish -- fewer than our 20 -- but 10 of their fish were sizeable keepers and half of those were true lunkers. How two veteran captains of equal expertise and experience aided by two equally qualified mates on two near-identical boats fishing exactly the same waters at exactly the same time using the same gear and applying the same techniques could find themselves at such opposite ends of the success spectrum would remain a mystery. For whatever reason, that fickle finger of fishing fate decided that, for this day at least, the Renegade would serve as the yin to the Reginaís yang. Perhaps the next trip will bring a reversal of fishing fortune. Guess weíll just have to wait and see, but we still all had a blast catching stripers on a gorgeous fall morning on the water.

STRIPER TRIP TO SOLOMONS: Give Captain Wally Talbert a call at 301-839-9270 for more information. The Solomons are about 150 miles from West Chester (about a 3 hour drive), so if you need a place to stay, check out the Holiday Inn Solomons Conference Center and Marina. Their facility is right on the water and you can walk from your room to the fishing docks. Contact them at 1 800 315 2621.

LOTS OF THROWBACKS: Later last week my ďall throwbacks, all the timeĒ fishing fortunes shifted from Chesapeake Bay to Ocean City Marylandís Isle of Wight Bay where I fished for fluke after reading an online fishing report that a party boat there had boated 34 keeper flounder in the bay that Sunday -- their best day fishing since 1995. Needless to say, I made a beeline back to Ocean City and revved up my boat on Wednesday evening and Thursday morning only to hook up with a total of 15 smallish flounder, no keepers that met Marylandís current legal standard of 16-inches. Apparently I had just missed the big bite. As they say, you shouldaí been here yesterday and/or just wait until tomorrow, but thatís fishiní. In any case, itís November and though the flounder bite may be fading, the tautog are cooperating, and action on coastal stripers and sea bass is picking up as well. Despite my unlucky fishing karma of late, Iím still expecting a great fall season.